By Ben Wolfgang, Republican & Herald, Pottsville, Pa.
Aug. 6–The changes won’t be obvious to patients — at least for now.
“Most likely, there will be no bed elimination,” John Simodejka, president/CEO of the newly formed Schuylkill Health System — the product of an affiliation between Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center and Pottsville Hospital and Warne Clinic — said Tuesday. “There is no anticipated layoff among staff. This is not a takeover. This, from day one, has been a partnership.”
Simodejka, along with board of directors Chairman Judge Joseph F. McCloskey and Vice Chair Judge William E. Baldwin, sat down with The REPUBLICAN & Herald on Tuesday to answer lingering questions about the reasons for and results of the recent “merger” between the two hospitals.
Medical operations at both locations will remain largely the same, but Simodejka said the affiliation will provide better, more thorough service in the future.
Patients, he said, will be unaffected by the move right now. In the future, he said, the effects will be positive, with the merger allowing advances in medical equipment.
Also, financial problems with the two hospitals were not a factor in the decision, hospital officials said.
Simodejka said the affiliation was made official late last week, with Good Samaritan now known as Schuylkill Medical Center-East Norwegian Street and Pottsville Hospital now known as Schuylkill Medical Center-South Jackson Street.
The new health system has about 1,900 employees and a combined 359 beds.
Many questions remained since the two hospitals announced a “letter of intent” to merge operations in September 2007. In the months following, the flow of information was scarce and, at times, non-existent.
“Could we have done better? Yes,” Simodejka said, but said he felt media coverage of the matter could have also been better.
Catholic presence
The Schuylkill Health System has no religious affiliation. The cross was removed from the former Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center last week, but Simodejka said he isn’t fearful of a backlash from area Catholics.
“I believe most people do not make their decision where they go for health care based on religious affiliation,” Simodejka said. “They make it based upon the doctor and the staff that will take care of them — at least, that’s what they should be making it on.”
Good Samaritan was previously sponsored by the Daughters of Charity and associated with Ascension Health, St. Louis — the largest nonprofit Catholic health system in the country.
“The Daughters of Charity participated in this whole decision,” Baldwin said. “They reached the decision that the best way to fulfill their mission of health care in the community was for the two hospitals to get together. We do that with their blessing, their support.”
Area Catholics, however, have fond memories of the nuns and their unique work at Good Samaritan. “We always did go to Good Sam,” Mary Luppino, 78, of Pottsville, a lifelong Catholic, said Tuesday. “We lost a baby in the 1960s and the nuns were the ones who broke the news to me. And the beautiful way they did that — you wouldn’t get that today.”
Luppino said she expects this generation of Catholics may not be as reluctant to seek care at a nonreligious hospital.
Older Catholics, however, will have to get used to it.
“They won’t have much of a choice, unless you want to go out of town,” Luppino said. “And who wants to do that?”
The decision also comes on the heels of a massive parish restructuring in Schuylkill County, which hospital officials said is in no way related to the hospital affiliation.
Pottsville Hospital was established in 1895. Good Samaritan was established in 1920.
Business as usual
Medical operations will continue as usual at both locations.
In the future, Simodejka said, management will look at ways to reduce duplication of services.
“Nothing has been consolidated as of yet,” he said. “We will be, in the first 30 to 90 days, looking at some items that have made sense (to consolidate). But also, we’ll be continuing that process over the next 90 to 180 days.”
Patients will continue to have a choice of which facility to visit during emergencies.
“Emergency departments will stay open at both locations,” Simodejka said. “We couldn’t combine them into one location even if we stacked them and packed them. We don’t have the financial resources to put $10 million into building a new emergency department.”
Also, Simodejka said any outstanding bills owed to either former hospital are now owned to Schuylkill Health System.
Due diligence
Between September 2007 and April 2008, the hospitals undertook a “due diligence” process, during which time little information was released.
“It was basically the time period when you’re allowing the other side to look at the other side without any blinders on,” he said, but added it was mostly “lawyers and consultants” doing the looking, not management from either hospital.
Late last week, a state attorney general investigation into the affiliation was completed and gave the green light.
Still, Simodejka said he kept details under wraps for employees’ sake.
“The reason the announcement didn’t go out on (July) 31st or (Aug.) 1st — that was an internal decision made by me and the board of directors,” he said. “I thought it was very important I speak to the employees myself, personally. I did not want to have them hear it through an e-mail or letter.”
He described the reaction of both employees within each facility and outside doctors associated with Schuylkill Health System as “very, very positive.”
Money not problem
The reasons — as each hospital stressed when the letter of intent was announced — have nothing to do with current financial issues.
“This has to do with financials for the future, not current financials,” Simodejka said, adding neither hospital was losing money in the years leading up to the merger.
McCloskey said the move will allow both facilities — both are still separately licensed with the state Department of Health — to put money together, giving greater flexibility when buying equipment and expanding services.
“What the attorney general really is saying, when he said there is no problem with the merger, is there is good competition and there is bad competition,” McCloskey said. “If the competition gets to the point where it’s stretching the resources (of either hospital), therefore money cannot go into better health care.”
Also, the move has been constantly referred to as an “affiliation” — not a merger — by hospital management.
On Tuesday, McCloskey and Baldwin acknowledged that the subtle difference in semantics fell on deaf ears, at least in the public.
“For practical purposes, it is a merger,” Baldwin said.
The new board
The Schuylkill Health System board of directors includes seven members from each former hospital board.
Board members from the former Pottsville Hospital board are: Debra C. Blaschak, William L. Jones III, Allen E. Kiefer, Jay M. Linard, Franklin K. Schoeneman, Robert M. Zimmerman and McCloskey.
Board members from the former Good Samaritan board are: Jesse C. Achenbach, Anthony Baran, Sarah T. Casey, James T. Gallagher, William E. Kirwan, Syed Shah and Baldwin.
Those 14 picked Judy K. Schmidt — human resources manager at SAPA Industrial Extrusions, Cressona — as the 15th member.
M. Michael Peckman, former spokesman for Pottsville Hospital, is now the Schuylkill Health System spokesman. Former Good Samaritan spokeswoman Michelle Canfield is no longer associated with the organization.
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